BioWorld International Correspondent

PARIS - Fovea Pharmaceuticals SA closed a Series B funding round in which it raised €30 million (US$44 million) from a group of six European venture capital firms led by first-time investor Forbion Capital Partners, of Naarden, the Netherlands.

All five of the company's existing institutional investors participated in the round, including: Sofinnova Partners, of Paris; Abingworth Management, of London; The Wellcome Trust, also of London; GIMV of Antwerp; and Crédit Agricole Private Equity, of Paris. Those five previously invested €20.5 million in Paris-based Fovea's November 2005 Series A financing.

Founded in May 2005, Fovea develops drugs for various ocular diseases, with a special focus on retinal pathologies. Its internal research programs are focused on dry age-related macular degeneration (AMD), glaucoma and retinal dystrophies, as well as clinical programs that are under way in indications such as macular edema, allergic conjunctivitis and retinitis pigmentosa.

Fovea plans to use the latest injection of funds to push ahead with its clinical and preclinical development programs and to further develop its technology platform.

The company's Chairman and CEO, Bernard Gilly, told BioWorld International that "our financial strategy was to be able to see three years ahead." As of Sept. 30, "we still had €7 million in the bank from the first funding round," he added.

The company's burn rate is running at €600,000 to €700,000 a month.

Gilly said he expects that by 2009 Fovea will have at least one product in Phase III trials and be in a position to consider various options both for the commercialization of successful drug candidates and for the company's future funding.

He was confident that one or more of Fovea's products would reach the market because "in ophthalmology, animal models are a good indicator of what happens in humans and these drugs have demonstrated therapeutic efficacy in other indications."

Fovea's clinical development program for 2008 will see the launch of Phase II trials of FOV1101, which is being developed to treat chronic allergic conjunctivitis, and FOV2302 and FOV2301, in development for acute and diabetic macular edema, respectively. In the first half of 2009, the company plans to move its fourth drug candidate, FOV2501, into the clinic in retinitis pigmentosa.

FOV1101 and FOV2301 are proprietary formulations of an enhanced steroid designed to maximize safety while maintaining clinical efficacy. Fovea acquired exclusive worldwide rights to those products for ophthalmological applications from CombinatoRx Inc., of Boston, in a February 2006 collaboration.

FOV2302 is an ophthalmic formulation of a small protein that is currently in Phase III trials in a different indication, while FOV2501 is an intravitreal formulation of the RdCVF protein discovered by Alain Sahel, co-founder of Fovea and chairman of its scientific advisory board. Fovea also has exclusive worldwide rights to that product.

Fovea has three other candidates in its pipeline - RD 27, RD 28 and RD 29 - in development for retinal dystrophies, AMD and glaucoma, respectively. All those products emanate from Fovea's own technology platform, and one of them is at the core of the collaboration the company entered into with Genzyme Corp., of Cambridge, Mass., at the end of November.

That deal covers the development of gene-related therapies for diseases of the eye using targets selected by Fovea and gene delivery technologies developed by Genzyme.

Following the completion of the funding round, Sander Slootweg, managing partner of Forbion Capital Partners, is joining the Fovea board of directors, which already includes Antoine Papiernik, of Sofinnova Partners; Tim Haines, of Abingworth; and Anthony Wild, of Bows Pharmaceuticals. Forbion Capital Partners previously was the venture capital arm of ABN AMRO Bank, of Amsterdam, but was spun off as an independent firm in December 2006 and currently manages assets of more than €200 million.